


Starchaser

by prettyoddmoon



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Boys In Love, Euphemia and Fleamont are literal saints, Harry is a little baby, James learns Regulus' fate, Letter, Letters, Multi, Pain, Regulus Black Deserves Better, Regulus describes their most sacred moments, Regulus writes a letter before his death, Romance, Starchaser, Walburga and Orion are assholes, intense angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-07
Updated: 2020-12-07
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:00:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,293
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27941918
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prettyoddmoon/pseuds/prettyoddmoon
Summary: An unsuspecting James receives a letter from an old friend on a placid April morning that dates back to as far as before the birth of his son.
Relationships: James Potter/Lily Evans Potter, Jegulus - Relationship, Jily - Relationship, Regulus Black/James Potter
Comments: 23
Kudos: 114





	Starchaser

**Author's Note:**

> trigger warning: parental abuse!! please read at your own risk.
> 
> IMPORTANT: sequel to this piece can be found [HERE!](https://archiveofourown.org/works/29928987)
> 
> this fic has been sitting in my files for the longest time, and i have finally found the courage in myself to properly finish and upload it. i, admittingly, love myself some jegulus and i do love myself some serious angst, and why not mix those two together, right? please do enjoy.

A frigid, fresh breeze swept into the room as though by force of a household broom. It came waltzing through an ajar window, pearl-white crochet curtains trembling in the spring air, paying an uncanny resemblance to the new, young leaves just sprouting from thin branches of the trees flourishing outside. Generous rays of the morning sun poked through the frame; outside stirred a weather painfully characteristic to the spring – the kind of weather where you wouldn't know whether to take an umbrella along or not, since the mornings tended to be sunny and cheerful, but the afternoons consequently faded into rainy gloom.

From upstairs, James heard the subtle cooing of a baby – _his_ baby; he by then had been well-aware that the first thing Lily did in the morning ever since little Harry was born was stroll into his nursery and wake him up if he hadn't awoken already, and cradled the little one, as any other benevolent mother would, so close to her chest that her and the baby's heartbeats gradually became one. She'd step from one foot to another, spin, and maybe prance, and usually, James would love to watch the aforementioned unfold before his eyes leant against the doorframe, but that morning, he had been persistent upon staying in bed; even for a little while. In that moment, that alien, cold breeze that had oh-so-rudely invited itself into the bedroom had embraced and engaged him tighter than anyone ever could. Or at least it felt that way.

His eyes fell shut, both body and brain mere seconds away from drifting back asleep. Maybe it was the inevitable tiredness of a new parent – though _new_ was certainly far-fetched, after all, since Harry had just surpassed the eight-month-mark – or the simple reluctance to leave the warm, cosy constraints of one's bed in the early morning. James tended to suffer from that, maybe a little more than he would like to admit, unlike his wife, or, for example, Remus. The two of them were the first two examples of cavalier, textbook early birds he could recite off the top of his head. Oh, and maybe...

If that thought had been a sheet of paper, James had hastily crumpled it and tossed it into the furthest nook of the room. Desperate to lose the pain-inducing notion, he forced his eyes open once more. Better awake and miserable than asleep and mentally dwelling on the past, he noted; it would only worsen that despair of his had he awoken from that nostalgic slumber. James was no philosopher, seriously, don't kid, and he wasn't conspiring, guessing, either, – the reason he was so sure as to how it'd go down was because he had experienced it firsthand on numerous occasions prior.

As he craned his neck to the side in order to lose the train of thought, he noticed a blob of carob-brown blur in the window frame – atop the sill, to be exact. He scrunched his eyes and squinted, to no avail, and used his left arm to reach over and grope the nightstand for his glasses. Having picked them up, he sat them upon his nose, and, blinking himself to comfort, gazed in the direction of the window.

A tall, luxurious and well-groomed owl was seated on the white, chipped wood that was the windowsill. The bird's eyes glowed with a vibrant, almost sharp shade of dijon, its haughty, carefree appearance ringing more than one bell within James' mind; he had recognised it in seconds.

“ _Junius?_ ” he wondered, piercing the tranquil silence of the air, voice still raspy from not using it all night. The owl didn't so much as make a single movement, gazing into the distance with an expression of utter boredom, seemingly dying to return to where it had flown in from. The bird was never one to be too sociable, James noted. Unbeknownst to him, his countenance had assumed a feeble smile. The owl couldn't care less about it, of course.

James rose from his and Lily's bed, limbs vibrating with the sudden movement and skin covering in faint goosebumps – after all, he had only been wearing his crimson underpants. Having strolled over to the owl, he took a moment to admire the small, green stone hung around its neck by a silver thread – a lavish accessory it had been adorned with ever since James could remember. Tied to a claw of walnut brown was an envelope; the rich, expensive parchment was as pleasant to the touch as it could ever be, and though it was only equipped with a destination address, solely by gripping it, solely by clutching it in his hands, solely due to the kind of parchment it had been, James immediately recognised who had sent it.

He lowered himself back onto the edge of the bed, mattress slumping beneath his weight, soft bedsheets crumpling and creasing. A sharp tear echoed across the room as he ripped the envelope open, unveiling a sheet of identical parchment drenched in letters of ebony ink from head to toe – an almost too familiar, neat and compact, yet classy handwriting reflected in the lenses of his glasses as he read:

To James

I have been sitting beneath the dim glow of my chandelier for multiple hours now, trying to bundle my thoughts the best I can. Both the rays of light and my thoughts are knifelike; I feel as though I am being monitored, as though every breath I take lures me deeper down a path I cannot return from. And maybe that is reality, and maybe I am not even seated here, up in my bedroom, locked away from Mother and Father, from Kreacher, from June – I have left him among the company of the family owls downstairs – he must despise me for it even more than he does now, but that was utmostly necessary, as I intend to be fully and utterly alone.

I must apologize for my prompt disappearance, for the sudden silence, for all the letters you expected to receive from me yet never did, and truth is, they never happened to get written in the first place. I am aware I promised to write, James, I truly am, and by the time you will hold this in those gentle, firm hands of yours, you will have brought months upon months behind you... To give you an idea of the timestamp: December has just begun, it is a rather windy day in the year of 1979, I am mere weeks shy of turning eighteen, and this sheet of parchment I am scribbling ink over is with grave certainty the last letter I will ever be writing in my life. You are my last addressee, the ultimate individual to receive my final word, the only one I care enough about to bid my noble goodbyes to.

You must be confused, and in order to explain everything from start to finish, I am afraid I would need a decade and a half, miles upon miles of parchment, and litres of ink. Beyond possessing all of that, I simply do not have the suited time at my command, as mine is running out slowly but surely as I scratch this page with my quill. I can still recall the last time Sirius and I ever spoke to each other – the ultimate thing he had ever said to me was how he wasn't surprised even in the slightest bit by the fact I had joined the Dark Lord's rounds. His words made me question many things, many decisions, many gambits, yet since then, I have come to the sole realisation: he doesn't have even a single clue as to why I made the decision to become a Death Eater, he never could. That sentence he had spat at me had been one of his many outbursts of saying something just for the purpose of speaking it into existence – to find a way to offend me in his usual fashion. He didn't think about that sentence twice, whereas I spent months pondering over the meaning.

Throughout my months spent on the dark side, as other people's beliefs of me grew progressively worse and worse, mine coursed in the opposite direction – upstream, if you will, since I had gone against the grain and everything I had ever believed in after all. My eyes burst open at last, and all the internalised prejudice I was raised with, the classism I cut my teeth on, the hatred that was settled into my bloodstream by default, the faithful conviction of blood supremacy, all washed away at once as though by resolute lick of a wave – I realised I wasn't in the right place, I realised I had chosen the wrong path, and though my parents, for once, find themselves profoundly proud of me and learned to see past my faults at last, I confess to having made one of the largest mistakes of my life – next to never shaping our lives to be intertwined forevermore, that is.

A sense of purpose sprouted within me, originating in a mixture of guilt and responsibility to make up for the years of wrongful thinking, acting, and merely existing. I was doomed from the very start; from the moment I was brought into this world on that frigid December morning Mother loathes to recall and deems the second worst day of her survival, from the first time I received a poisonous remark from the very people I looked up to most – you guessed it, my parents – from the day my unsuspecting body was struck with its first Cruciatus Curse, from the constant dried trails of tears upon glacial cheeks, from the unnecessary cruelty performed upon two oblivious young boys ever since going as far as their memory can grasp. From the moment Sirius first held me as an infant up until the very second he spat in my face and then on the threshold of our house the day it ceased to be _his_ once and for all. I tend to believe all of those events have shaped me as a person, for better or for worse, and contributed to the development of my views and actions. Though right now, I can assure you, James, that I have found a way to demolish the Dark Lord once and for all – I have unravelled His most obscure secret, and am one last leap away from weakening Him with such significance one simple cough in His direction would cause the man to topple. I hope to, strive to, end the war with my sacrifice – and if I don't, to at least allay it. Numb the pain. Slow Him down. Must you receive this letter, be sure I have gone through with my mission. What it entails is a story of its own; a story never to be passed down from generation to generation, from father to son and mother to daughter, to never see the light of day, as I am not deserving of the glory whatsoever.

I am a coward. I know. I have been told more times than I can count – even _you_ have hinted at it once or twice, and I understood, although I might've not shown it or didn't properly own up to it. Again – a coward move, isn't it? _That_ is the exact reason as to why my story doesn't deserve to be told. All I will be saying is, that, whatever it is I committed, or, as of now, am about to commit, James, you must know I did it for _you_ , for your future offspring, and for the sake of the entirety of wizardkind and its precious preservation, survival, and prosperity. I go down with the intent of a clear sky, a sky of no murderous smoke hanging heavy in the air, of no spiteful, biased particles contaminating the freshness it can offer – a cloudless sky of hope and renaissance.

You must also be enraged, even holding a grudge or two against me, and believe me, James, I would trade anything I have ever possessed in my lifetime for you to let them go. Maybe this letter will be of help, maybe not, after all, I don't quite know what kind of man you have grown up to be, now that you're a _father_ – yes, Lily has told me she is with child, and despite the amount of glee I am flooded with at the idea of the two of you raising a Prongs Junior or a Mini Evans (or both – that would be simply glorious), my heart cannot help but shrivel up as though a salt-strewn slug with a stinging sense of envy. I would be lying if I ever said I hadn't hoped, fantasised, or dwelled upon the life you and I could've shared. That is so selfish of me, I am aware, and am endlessly sorry for, I just simply cannot stop thinking, wallowing in the memories of you and me, when we felt as though we were hovering above ground instead of walking, as though we had all the time in the world, as though we _were_ the world...

Do you remember our very first encounter? My first year at Hogwarts, you had about started your second. Sirius had introduced me to you, Remus, Peter and Lily just outside the Great Hall. Before you had even stumbled upon me, I was stood there, as though glued to the ground, the tall, ominous castle walls mesmerising yet intimidating me all at the same time. I was lost, gaping about when the lot of you found me, swooped me up, and made acquaintance. _This is Regulus, my baby brother._ _I've told you all about him._ Had he really?

You were significantly shorter back then – I was, too, although nevertheless smaller than you (how could I not be?!) – and, looking back, I should have accustomed to you towering over me. You have undergone a handful of changes since then – your hair is darker and, somehow, even messier, frame lankier, you have gone through countless pairs of glasses (I put the blame on Bludgers and drunken banter), but that grin of yours, that grin remains the same. I can see it in my mind's eye clear as day, even right now, this instant, having not seen you for five months and twenty-eight days. I do keep track... do not think ill of me.

Despite it all, the first detail I ever noticed about you were those crimson-and-gold trainers – I remember thinking your feet were a little large for your age – and even stifled a giggle at the attempted drawing of a snitch on the side of them. Painting has never been your strong suit, now has it? How long did it take your Mother to notice it, again?

 _It was worth the trouble_ , you had told me atop the Astronomy Tower that one night in October. Only Merlin knows why you had been prowling about the castle halls alone at eleven o'clock, but with whatever it is I possess, I thank the force that led you to me, who had been doing the exact same, as that would be the day that kick-started our very own story. I know I seemed reluctant, I know I made it look as though I wanted you to leave, but you must have seen right through me; you must have recognised I truly didn't mean it – you wouldn't have persisted upon staying otherwise. You proceeded to entertain me with every last humorous story you have witnessed throughout your fifteen years of existence, and I listened to every last word that waltzed on your tongue as though my life depended on it. My breath quickened every once in a while – I think it was merely me occasionally concluding that I was with _you_ vis-à-vis over and over again – and I even found myself praying to whoever was listening that you wouldn't notice the fact. After all, we laid right next to one another, close enough that the overwhelming body warmth radiating off of you coated my left sleeve, the one closest to you. If I squeeze my eyes shut hard enough, I can still feel it hugging my flesh. That was the second time we had been alone together, and the very first time we had been stargazing.

I kissed you first. If my memory happened to be erased, I would still remember that I kissed you first. I had recently turned fifteen and you were about to turn sixteen – I could tell you had been dying to kiss me for the past several weeks; your eyes constantly shifted down to my lips whenever we would say our goodbyes, and your own trembled, as though desperate to part and coalesce with mine at any given moment. I was forced to get on my tiptoes in order to be able to even reach your mouth, and that was the day you learned to pull me up by my waist and lean down in order to kiss me. You tasted of blackforest trifle with a pinch of nervousness – I realised I would never want anything more for dessert than you (how cheesy did that sound on a scale from one to ten, my love?).

The day I recognised I loved you was different from the day I had confessed. Do not get me wrong; I had always known my admiration for you went beyond sole platonic appreciation. You, James, managed to make my heart leap within my chest and my stomach twist in ribbons. The way I felt about Lily – you know better than anyone she had swept me underneath her gentle wing and I consider her one of my best friends to this day; you have truly won the wife lottery, my love – could never compare to the way I felt about you, and oftentimes I even wondered whether or not I loved you more than my own brother. When I was still juggling with the possibilities of my identity, I went as far as considering the theory you served as a replacement of Sirius, but soon came to realise the love my heart held for you was lightyears away from brotherly love. It was the kind of love capable of melting iron, bending reality, cause hell to freeze over and the core of our planet to turn into an apple with a simple flick of one's fingers. I just realised I had been writing in the past tense all along – I allow you to go back and correct it all, since I remain loving you the very same and would never reconsider, not in a trillion years, and not for any type of bribe. My existence underwent its personal sort of renaissance when I met you and eventually fell in love; that privy infatuation engendered a rebirth of my whole being, and it shan't end any different from how it started – with me loving you.

Which, before all else, ensued on the day you invited me to meet your parents. It's sort of comical that I only became aware of my true feelings toward you when I grasped you loved me, too. Safe to say – I had been head over heels for you _for weeks_ before the initial realisation, but as though an oblivious fool, my brain never truly registered the fact up until I had met your family and the cognisance of _I am not just a friend to him_ punched me in the gut with all its might, blinded my eyesight, and numbed my senses. I had never pondered on it much – the fact my heart beat in a pattern that emulated the way you merely existed, mimicking the motif of your steps, your breaths, and your speech. Had you gasped, my blood curdled; had you run, my heart raced along – no matter where I resided, no matter how far away you were located.

 _Honey_ was the first word your Mother spoke my way. I had stood glued to the doorstep, my nerves tingling with suspense, sending multiple sets of shivers down my spine and causing my limbs to either fall asleep or run cold – I was so volatile I cannot quite recall. She had opened the door clad in that particular floral dress of hers, that was the first thing I noticed about Euphemia – water-coloured hyacinths flourishing atop a fabric of pure white, with her mahogany hair pinned to the side, cascading in waves so resemblant to yours over one shoulder. Once we locked eyes it was as though you were gazing back at me through orbs of riveting hazel, and having crooned that term of endearment, she immediately threw her arms around me, locking my body in an embrace it was _so_ not used to. I stiffened up as though a candle, but Euphemia didn't let go, she _knew_ , and kept me cradled in her arms until safety and contentment came rushing through me, brought on by the motherly love I was so deprived of, beaconed towards me in the very moment I longed for something akin to that most. Ever since that day, I had been aware I wasn't entirely unloved by this world.

Food had always counted as a sole nourishing element to provide one's body with the needed supplements and nutriments in my book – nothing more, nothing less, as one of the grand, stipulated rules of my House urged immediate presence in the dining room for each and every repast. As expected, I dreaded mealtime with every oncoming day, feigning illness more than often in order to have Kreacher serve directly to my room. That view of mine, once again, shifted, when I got to know your family. Instead of routinely house-elf cuisine, your Mother made the precious effort to cook every given day. She hummed, whistled, and pranced while stood at the stove, wand gliding through the air with such ease and such devotion I had never witnessed prior. You must know this better than me, but your Mother pours her heart, soul and spirit into those dishes she serves you – no matter what it is, no matter how much she thinks you'll like it, no matter how hard she is prone to work on it. The first time I dined at your place, my heart indulged in a sharp leap and fluttered in my chest – it was as though the tenderness Euphemia streamed into her creations melted right through my tastebuds and insides, thereupon diffusing veins and transporting the love into my cardiac organ, which tugged at all of its valves, inflating something that had collapsed and shrivelled into a flappy mess of tissue back into shape.

One of the most joyous activities Euphemia and Fleamont ever delighted me in was when they showcased me one of your very many family photo albums. Wizards – your relatives and ancestors – unknown to me clad in robes of mauve, gold, and onyx, or just casual Muggle clothes, bunched together, captured in moments of glee, love, pride, surprise, or sheer contentment. Somewhere, I picked up the saying 'A picture speaks more than a thousand words ever could', and though I am a firm believer in the intelligible supremacy of writing, at that moment, I couldn't ever agree more. Especially when it came to photos of _you_. Whether you were portrayed clumsily mounting your first broom, chewing on the tough wood the dining table is made of, or seated in front of a burly birthday cake with ravenous eyes, somehow, I felt like in that moment, I had been present as well – as though I had known you my whole life. I never admitted just how much your childhood photos exhilarated me, besides, it would be a rather strange or even obsessive thing to admit, wouldn't it? – but nevertheless, here I am, spelling out my confession on paper. Images of a younger James, a younger _you_ , always brought me intense joy; such as pictures of you riding your broom as though a skateboard of sorts, pictures of you brushing your teeth while hanging off of the shower curtain rod like a bat, pictures of you with your first mock wand sticking out of your nose. _Pictures that had never been taken of me._ Pictures _my_ family never cared to take of us. They would just have our portraits taken every other year for good measure and the peace of mind of relatives overseas, and that would be all. Your pictures introduced me to a whole different world, your pictures breathed the desire to capture every single moment of my life from the second I had left your home into me, your pictures made me a believer in keeping hold and track of events that would go down throughout my lifespan. The lack of childhood photos is probably the reason the only detail I vividly remember about it is the pain and the burdening weight of it all, because for the majority of images taken of people, they wouldn't even remember the occurrence, that day, or the context of it hadn't they kept a reminder in form of a photograph. I had never been one to be able to boast about the possession of a brilliant memory, but ever since I met you, I have begun putting more value into maintaining more and more situations within my mind for a longer span of time. Whether it was due to the realisation I hadn't been prior to that or the fact I was simply so content and happy with you I wanted to commemorate our moments together forevermore, I still don't know, yet there is a myriad of questions I will never find out the answer to before I die.

And one of them, for instance, would be if your Mother has perfected her Strudel recipe (has she?). Baking alongside Euphemia on a Sunday morning after I had woken up in your embrace with the remainders of the night before still pleasantly prickling at my skin with that homey buzz was an experience, a memory, a fraction of my life which I would never trade for anything on this planet. It seems like just a silly thing, finding so much genuine joy in measuring ingredients, mixing them, and creating something so delicious with your own hands, but that predilection of mine roots in yet another set of experiences I hold very dear to my heart. I am not sure I have told you this before, but when Sirius and I were children and he had assumed the fashion to spend hours upon hours up in the attic spying on Muggles out on the street, yearning to learn more about them and why wizardkind despised the lot as much as he was taught it did, and I had been eager to play, eager to be entertained, as toddlers often are, and he would send me away time after time, it was none other than Kreacher keeping me company and providing me with the needed care I expected of my brother. But what could a house-elf as old as the hills teach a small child? I started by observing him as he cooked for us; I used to silently sit in the kitchen for hours on end, simply watching him shuffle about, drop utensils, season food, stir substances around in pots, puzzle over new recipes, clash and clank pans together, polish the cutlery, do the washing-up, brew tea. At first, neither one of us spoke. Soon enough, I would be helping him out, and in return, he would take time out of his rather tight schedule of cooking, cleaning and tending to his masters to occasionally bake with me. Madeleines, profiteroles, éclairs, you name it, we made it all. Baking had always been a vital part of my life, and your Mother has simply emphasised its value and brought up many good memories to the surface of events that I had almost forgotten I even lived through in the first place. Pleasant memories; ones that triggered nostalgia.

When I finally became acquainted with your parents, I ultimately understood where your love language in form of touch took its origin. Euphemia and Fleamont expressed their affection in the very same manner, be it towards you, each other, guests, let alone me. Within one day spent at your home amongst your relatives, I would get entangled in more embraces than I had ever been throughout the entirety of my childhood, would have my back pat as though a well-behaved tomcat's, and would have my shoulders rubbed enough to release all the tension gathered within them after years upon years of turmoil at once. Another cordial act your Mother used to perform was whenever we were all seated at the dining table, the one you had once sunk your teeth in in one of those childhood photographs, she would gently position her palm atop mine, slightly caress or reassuringly squeeze it, especially when you took to rambling on about our shared dates or how much joy my company brought unto you on the daily. I am sure she sensed how we felt towards one another, and Fleamont did, too, and they never judged, never even considered spewing a single bad word at us or our union, it never even crossed their minds _once_ how according to popular belief, it was conventionally inappropriate for two boys to be in love with each other. I can only imagine the volume of the howls and shrieks issued my way and the agony of the curses blasted at me had I even gaped my beak about said topic at my own home. I fear you will never be able to understand the sheer profoundness of the comfort you and your family have granted me, with, seemingly, the most natural and normal actions. For them. I myself had never experienced true, proper domestic affection within my own household on such a level your loved ones elevated it unto.

And for it all, I am eternally grateful. Grateful for Euphemia, for Fleamont, for the fact they managed to free me from my callous parental constraints, even if for a number of hours at a time. For demonstrating to me what real familial affection meant, what it felt like to be appreciated by those who planted you into this world, what an authentic, ironclad domestic cohesion entailed. For inspiriting me from the depths of my insides with their hospitality and food, for the uncoerced fondness and pure, natural acceptance. In short: all the things my own parents fell flat on. Every part about you – including your Mother and Father – breathes life into me, even now, when I am counting down my last hours.

You played Chaser. I played Seeker. I hope you seriously don't think I didn't notice how you kept close watch of Bludgers, too, even though it wasn't even in the realm of your responsibilities, making sure one wouldn't dart at me, and if it did, nonchalantly prevent it from doing so. Of course I realised; I had been doing the same. For the longest time, I oftentimes found myself hoping Gryffindor would win against us, just to be able to see your gleeful, cheery face – victory suited you so well, James, it painted your face in colours so radiant and alluring there was nothing else I thought about for weeks but that image of you; victorious, vibrant, and jubilant. After a while, I came to the conclusion that you had the very same reaction no matter the outcome – had we drawn, had we won, had we lost, your jolliness remained the very same. I recognised: you delighted in the process, in the act itself, rather than the consequence. Sure, you preferred winning – you would have tails of students following you with words of congratulations; the glory was all yours, and you basked in it. But what went beyond glory was the mere feeling of accomplishment – you felt ecstatic enough to have played, victory was merely an added bonus you would never say no to. This has always fascinated me about you; before we met, I wouldn't have deemed it possible for a human being to house so much pure joviality within them – it would translate to outright nonsensical. But there you were, flesh and blood, the embodiment of vibrant euphoria gathered in a brawny, six-foot-one frame. You were the first person to make me smile with my teeth out of genuine amusement and admiration, and I daresay you may add that to the great list of accomplishments you have achieved so far – I believe you will appreciate that quite a lot.

If you ask me, I believe our bond was one conceived long before we were born, as though the universe whispered, and someone, luckily enough, found themselves listening to its ballad and adapted it into a play akin to an amorous dramaturg. A ballad depicting two unfortunate lovebound fools, a ballad with the most marvellous beginning and a very striking, sudden end, a covert ballad not to be unveiled to those undeserving of it. You were the imperious chaser to my abstract star, yet in virtue of fate's rather ironic pleasantry, we were star-crossed to the point our celestial affinity would never steelify. But there we were, together, as though by some supreme, divine prompt. We unwisely assumed what we shared bore no expiration date, blinded by the company of one another and more so by the intoxicating charms of infatuation. Yet through it all, we were brilliant. We were luminous. We were flawless.

And when you ended it, you ended it rightfully. Once the blindness began wearing off, both of us halted at the conclusion the relations we kept up – or at least their concealment – would never last. As though a graceful figurine propped up on a shelf of an outrageously wealthy household, we were crafted of the most fragile crystal, with one wrong move or decision capable of drawing us to the brink of termination. Whether it was right or wrong isn't a question for me to answer, as I believe I might be biased, but it is safe to say it wasn't meant to persist for too long, not with the circumstances we herded ourselves into. The bond of our souls remained exceptionally clandestine; a secret kept between the two of us, our lips never daring to shed the truth and never planning on doing so, either. It was only Remus who became aware due to a silly misstep – him and no one else. I suppose he will take _us_ to his grave, no matter how much he ever grows to love Sirius – that I can trust him with. You were born to be with Lily and you know it, James, you were simply cut out for the job: to bring her the utmost happiness, which, I suppose we can collectively agree on, she fully deserves. How would I know? Because that is precisely what you did to me.

Making Lily happy wouldn't work if you continued lying to her and your closest friends, if you continued going behind their backs in order to sneak in remote, fraudulent meetings with me, if you continued obscuring the real you and your undeniable intentions with me. To cut to the chase: none of it would simply work with me in the way, and thus, that night we last saw one another, you had made one of the most valuable decisions of your life. Your usually pleasantly warm hands had run cold and trembled as they grasped onto mine as though seeking immediate warmth that I could not offer, your tawny cheeks glistened with pearly trails of tears, your newest spectacles failed to conceal the sleek glaze upon your hazel eyes. You couldn't gather your words, but I understood, I saw it all translated through your mien and your disposition, you shan't have said anything at all, as with every syllable, you drove the dagger deeper and deeper not only into mine, but into your own heart, as well. Our very last kiss scattered snowflakes all over my lips, so icy and spiky it was, and now, for every time I step out into the frigidness of London and the glacial wind brushes my face, I am reminded of the mild taste your lips bore on that uncommonly cold night on the fifth of June, and the contrast of the sultry saltiness the tears that streamed into it brought – whether they were yours or mine, I cannot bring myself to summon into mind. When we let go at last, though it was obvious you despised to, it felt as though a fragment of myself remained stuck on you, as though it had burned onto you with the influence of the immediate yet faint explosion of my soul. Call me an egoist for admitting a share of me will remain with you forevermore, but I am convinced you won't find yourself disagreeing.

Do not get me wrong: it was the right choice to make, James, and I could never blame you for it. I still love you, and I could never stop, not if I tried to, not if I forced myself to, not if I took some sort of medicine as though loving you was a malady with a known cure. Lily is the one you truly belong with, and I am saying this from within the most profound and sincere depths of my heart that loves you oh, so much. A heart that had never fully developed due to the lack of love and affection it was provided with (or, in a manner of speaking, wasn't), and you held that minuscule, delicate heart of mine in your strong hands, carrying it along anyplace you went every day of your survival, and I believe the aforementioned hasn't changed to this day. I truly wonder if you will notice the moment it ceases to beat in its cut and dried patterns for good... won't be long now.

My sweet love, my gracious saviour, my bare-boned happiness, my sacred sanctuary to return to, my personal safe place. With all the appreciation I have left for you, I hope you lead a long, blissful life, raise your children to be incredible wix with an unadulterated bravery like yours, an affluent intelligence like Lily's, and an unspeakable beauty of both soul and face that is characteristic for the pair of you. There is nothing that would intoxicate me with more glee than learning you're in a peaceful state surrounded by those you love and love you back as equally, hence I won't be there to do so any longer. Live the life we always dreamed and fantasised of back atop the Astronomy Tower with our eyes glued to the constellations peppered about the sky and our hands locked in an ardent embrace. Experience all the things you always emphasised you wanted to witness and undergo with me by your side. Indulge in the sweetest bites of existence and never take anything too seriously, though, knowing you, that is par for the course. You will remain my everything for all eternity, way beyond the moment I draw my last breath; our union has always been one to persist through all attempts of disruption and destruction – I blame it on your rather pugnacious spirit and my very own stubbornness.

And therefore, I prime to enter eternal slumber and mean to say my farewell. I would ask not to forget me, but that would be fueled by pathos. Remember the moments we shared and cherished; I shall be going down with specks of past memories circling my mind. You were the first thing I couldn't stop thinking about, and it is you who will be the last thing I won't be able to get out of my head. We shall meet again someplace, somewhen, somehow.

Yours at last  
R.A.B.

Another frigid, fresh breeze swooped in and absorbed James' face in sudden wintriness. With his body limp and unable to make a movement, he attempted to digest the words read, recognising he would fail no matter how passionately he tried. A set of shivers crawled down the length of his spine; the sentences seemed so hard to comprehend all of a sudden, the entirety of it so unexpected. Admittingly, he was struck harder than he ever estimated a letter from Regulus would strike. James would never come to terms with it... all of it. _He was dead._ And for what's worse, he could _never_ tell, automatically putting himself in the position of not only having to _explain_ the letter, its contents and their nature, but also _why_ it was Regulus' brother's best friend, _a nobody_ , to receive his last word instead of his immediate family. _What had he done..._

To his surprise, Junius the owl was still perched upon the windowsill, though still as unbothered as a handful of minutes prior. The bird's magnificent pecan-coloured feathers trembled with the sweeping wind introducing itself into the bedroom, and James tilted his head to the side in order to glare upon it again.

With a feeble smile quivering into place on his countenance, he whispered, “Who sent you?”

James very obviously questioned the void, as even a magical owl was incapable of answering questions. Junius merely eyed the man with his yellow sew-on buttons for eyes and averted his unperturbed gaze. In response, Potter delighted in a tense chortle though his heart had sunk as far as all the way down to his soles, somehow finding comfort in being reminded of the owl's attitude, as it contributed to one of the many things he remembered and cherished about Regulus – who had written and sent him a letter shortly before he passed on. A letter James kept grasped in his hands, which he hadn't even noticed had been jittering all along, along with the rest of his frame. A letter Regulus once gripped in his own hands and scribbled ink onto, back when he was still _alive_. The very same pair of cold, ghostly-pale hands James had once held himself, also back when he was still _alive_. That was the punchline. _Regulus was no longer alive._

Now he knew for certain. That past year had been shrouded in the shadow of doubt and mystery when it came to Regulus' whereabouts and general state. Not a single soul was aware of where he'd gone, some tongues spoke about sudden rebellion, some ventured into the topic of kidnapping, some mentioned murder, some simply tied. James believed none of them. Deep down, he trusted that Regulus would never disappear without bidding a final goodbye to him – and as it turned out, he wasn't wrong. Sirius had by then been convinced his baby brother was, indeed, dead at the hands of the Dark Lord, refused to speak of him, and if he ever did, it was no less than ill. James could never bring himself to assume that belief without having received any proof. Now he had. _Regulus was no longer alive._

“ _Darling?_ ” Lily's mellow voice resounded from upstairs, shooting through the almost deathly silence as though an arrow to the heart; a heart that had just cracked and broken apart. “Harry's made a mess, could you fetch me a cloth, please?”

James gulped reluctantly, the lump in his throat the size of a tennis ball, it felt, with all sorts of thoughts circling his mind on a neverending loop. With his hand clutching onto the ink-covered parchment for dear life, he tried to make himself snap out of it, but soon enough realised he would never be able to from that day forward. He coughed, throat not clearing of the stupor that was clogging it.

“I'll be right there.”

**Author's Note:**

> that's it... or is it? read the sequel [by clicking here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/29928987). i hope you enjoyed? if you're feeling up for it, say hi to me on my twitter – @/nobleregulus ! i'm friendly <3


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